This pair of canterburys is identical to the one that was made by Duncan Phyfe for his daughter, Eliza Vail, which is illustrated in McClelland, Duncan Phyfe and the English Regency (New York, 1939), pl. 106. Extremely rare to have a pair, canterburys were a specialized furniture form created as a result of the social emphasis in the musical accomplishments of women in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Designed to be a stand for music books, canterburys were placed in either the drawing room or parlor, the focal gathering places for musical activities.

Another identical canterbury attributed to Phyfe is illustrated in, American Antiques from Isreal Sack Colletion, vol. 1, no. 6 (January, 1960), p. 132, no. 370; a rosewood example of the same form is privately owned. For a related cast-iron example stamped Gaspar Godone of New York, see, Scherer, New York Furniture at the New York State Museum (Albany, 1983), fig. 79.